In the soft-creeping dusk came Andy Green, slouched in the saddle with
the weariness of riding since dawn; slouched to one side and singing,
with his hat far back on his head and the last of a red sunset tinting
darkly the hills above him. Tip-toe on a pinnacle a great, yellow star
poised and winked at him knowingly. Andy's eyes twinkled answer as he
glanced up that way. “We've got her going, old-timer,” he announced
lazily to the star.
Six miles back toward the edge of the “breaks” which are really the
beginning of the Badlands that border the Missouri River all through
that part of Montana, an even five hundred head of the Flying U's best
grade cows and their calves were settling down for the night upon a
knoll that had been the bed-ground of many a herd. At the Flying U
ranch, in the care of the Old Man, were the mortgages that would make
the Happy Family nominal owners of those five hundred cows and their
calves. In the morning Andy would ride back and help bring the herd upon
its spring grazing ground, which was the claims; in the meantime he was
leisurely obeying an impulse to ride into One Man coulee and spend
the night under his own roof. And, say what you will, there is a
satisfaction not to be denied in sleeping sometimes under one's own
roof; and it doesn't matter in the least that the roof is made of
prairie dirt thrown upon cottonwood poles. So he sang while he rode, and
his voice boomed loud in the coulee and scared long stilled echoes into
repeating the song:
“We're here because we're here, because we're here,
because we're here,
“We're here because we're here, because we're here,
because we're here--”
That, if you please, is a song; there are a lot more verses exactly
like this one, which may be sung to the tune of Auld Lang Syne with much
effectiveness when one is in a certain mood. So Andy sang, while his
tired horse picked its way circumspectly among the scattered rocks of
the trail up the coulee.
“It's time you're here, it's time you're here,
It's time that you were here--”
mocked an echo not of the hills.
Andy swore in his astonishment and gave his horse a kick as a mild hint
for haste. He thought he knew every woman-voice in the neighborhood--or
had until the colony came--but this voice, high and sweet and with a
compelling note that stirred him vaguely, was absolutely strange. While
he loped forward, silenced for the moment, he was conscious of a swift,
keen thankfulness that Pink had at the last minute decided to stay in
camp that night instead of accompanying Andy to One Man. He was in
that mood when a sentimental encounter appealed to him strongly; and a
woman's voice, singing to him from One Man cabin, promised undetermined
adventure.
He did not sing again. There had been something in the voice that held
him quiet, listening, expectant. But she also was silent after that
last, high note--like a meadow lark startled in the middle of his song,
thought Andy whimsically.
He came within sight of the cabin, squatting in the shadow of the grove
at its back. He half expected to see a light, but the window was
dark, the door closed as he had left it. He felt a faint, unreasoning
disappointment that it was so. But he had heard her. That high note that
lingered upon the word “here” still tingled his senses. His eyes sent
seeking glances here and there as he rode up.
Then a horse nickered welcomingly, and someone rode out from the deeper
shadow at the corner of the cabin, hesitated as though tempted to
flight, and came on uncertainly. They met full before the cabin, and the
woman leaned and peered through the dusk at Andy.
“Is this--Mr. Mallory--Irish?” she asked nervously. “Oh dear! Have I
gone and made a fool of myself again?”
“Not at all! Good evening, Miss Allen.” Andy folded his hands upon the
saddle horn and regarded her with a little smile, Keen for what might
come next.
“But you're not Irish Mallory. I thought I recognized the voice, or I
wouldn't have--” She urged her horse a step closer, and Andy observed
from her manner that she was not accustomed to horses. She reined as if
she were driving, so that the horse, bewildered, came sidling up to him.
“Who are you?” she asked him sharply.
“Me? Why, I'm a nice young man--a lot better singer than Irish. I guess
you never heard him, did you?” He kept his hands folded on the horn, his
whole attitude passive--a restful, reassuring passivity that lulled her
uneasiness more than words could have done.
“Oh, are you Andy Green? I seem to connect that name with your
voice--and what little I can see of you.”
“That's something, anyway.” Andy's tone was one of gratitude. “It's two
per cent. better than having to tell you right out who I am. I met you
three different times, Miss Allen,” he reproached.
“But always in a crowd,” she defended, “and I never talked with you,
particularly.”
“Oh, well, that's easily fixed,” he said. “It's a nice night,” he added,
looking up appreciatively at the brightening star-sprinkle. “Are you
living on your claim now? We can talk particularly on the way over.”
Miss Allen laughed and groped for a few loose hairs, found them and
tucked them carefully under her hatcrown. Andy remembered that gesture;
it helped him to visualize her clearly in spite of the deepening night.
“How far have you ridden today, Mr. Green?” she asked irrelevantly.
“Since daylight, you mean? Not so very far counting miles--We were
trailing a herd, you see. But I've been in the saddle since sunrise,
except when I was eating.”
“Then you want a cup of coffee, before you ride any farther. If I get
down, will you let me make it or you? I'd love to. I'm crazy to see
inside your cabin, but I only rode up and tried to peek in the window
before you came. I have two brothers and a cousin, so I understand men
pretty well and I know you can talk better when you aren't hungry.”
“Are you living on your claim?” he asked again, without moving.
“Why, yes. We moved in last week.”
“Well, we'll ride over, then, and you can make coffee there. I'm not
hungry right now.”
“Oh.” She leaned again and peered at him, trying to read his face. “You
don't WANT me to go in!”
“Yes, I do--but I don't. If you stayed and made coffee, tomorrow you'd
be kicking yourself for it, and you'd be blaming me.” Which, considering
the life he had lived, almost wholly among men, was rather astute of
Andy Green.
“Oh.” Then she laughed. “You must have some sisters, Mr. Green.” She was
silent for a minute, looking at him. “You're right,” she said quietly
then. “I'm always making a fool of myself, just on the impulse of the
moment. The girls will be worried about me, as it is. But I don't want
you to ride any farther, Mr. Green. What I came to say need not take
very long, and I think I can find my way home alone, all right.”
“I'll take you home when you're ready to go,” said Andy quietly. All at
once he had wanted to shield her, to protect her from even so slight an
unconventionality as making his coffee for him. He had felt averse to
putting her at odds with her conventional self, of inviting unfavorable
criticism of himself; dimly, because instinct rather than cold analysis
impelled him. What he had told her was the sum total of his formulated
ideas.
“Well, I'm ready to go now, since you insist on my being conventional.
I did not come West with the expectation of being tied to a book of
etiquette, Mr. Green. But I find one can't get away from it after all.
Still, living on one's own claim twelve miles from a town is something!”
“That's a whole lot, I should say,” Andy assured her politely, and
refrained from asking her what she expected to do with that eighty
acres of arid land. He turned his tired horse and rode alongside her,
prudently waiting for her to give the key.
“I'm not supposed to be away over here, you know,” she began when they
were near the foot of the bluff up which the trail wound seeking the
easiest slopes and avoiding boulders and deep cuts. “I'm supposed to
be just out riding, and the girls expected me back by sundown. But I've
been trying and trying to find some of you Flying U boys--as they call
you men who have taken so much land--on your claims. I don't know that
what I could tell you would do you a particle of good--or anyone else.
But I wanted to tell you, anyway, just to clear my own mind.”
“It does lots of good just to meet you,” said Andy with straightforward
gallantry. “Pleasures are few and far between, out here.”
“You said that very nicely, I'm sure,” she snubbed. “Well, I'm going
to tell you, anyway--just on the chance of doing some good.” Then she
stopped.
Andy rode a rod or two, glancing at her inquiringly, waiting for her to
go on. She was guiding her horse awkwardly where it needed only to be
let alone, and he wanted to give her a lesson in riding. But it seemed
too early in their acquaintance for that, so he waited another minute.
“Miss Hallman is going to make you a lot of trouble,” she began
abruptly. “I thought perhaps it might be better for you--all of
you--if you knew it in advance, so there would be no sudden anger and
excitement. All the settlers are antagonistic, Mr. Green--all but me,
and one or two of the girls. They are going to do everything they can to
prevent your land-scheme from going through. You are going to be watched
and--and your land contested--”
“Well, we'll be right there, I guess, when the dust settles,” he filled
in her thought unmoved.
“I--almost hope so,” she ventured. “For my part, I can see the
side--your side. I can see where it is very hard for the cattle men to
give up their range. It is like the big plantations down south, when
the slaves were freed. It had to be done, and yet it was hard upon those
planters who depended on free labor. They resented it deeply; deeply
enough to shed blood--and that is one thing I dread here. I hope, Mr.
Green, that you will not resort to violence. I want to urge you all
to--to--”
“I understand,” said Andy softly. “A-course, we're pretty bad when we
get started, all right. We're liable to ride up on dark nights and shoot
our enemies through the window--I can't deny it, Miss Allen. And if it
comes right to a show-down, I may as well admit that some of us would
think nothing at all of taking a man out and hanging him to the first
three we come to, that was big enough to hold him. But now that ladies
have come into the country, a-course we'll try and hold our tempers
down all we can. Miss Hallman, now--I don't suppose there's a man in the
bunch that would shoot her, no matter what she done to us. We take pride
in being polite to women. You've read that about us, haven't you, Miss
Allen? And you've seen us on the stage--well, it's a fact, all right.
Bad as we are, and wild and tough, and savage when we're crossed, a lady
can just do anything with us, if she goes at it the right way.”
“Thank you. I felt sure that you would not harm any of us. Will you
promise not to be violent--not to--to--”
Andy sat sidewise in the saddle, so that he faced her. Miss Allen could
just make out his form distinctly; his face was quite hidden, except
that she could see the shine of his eyes.
“Now, Miss Allen,” he protested with soft apology “You musta known what
to expect when you moved out amongst us rough characters. You know I can
make any promises about being mild with the men that try to get the best
of us. If you've got friends--brothers--anybody here that you think a
lot of Miss Allen, I advise you to send 'em outa the country, before
trouble breaks loose; because when she starts she'll start a-popping.
I know I can't answer for my self, what I'm liable to do if they bother
me; and I'm about the mildest one in the bunch. What the rest of the
boys would do--Irish Mallory for instance--I hate to think, Miss Allen.
I--hate--to--think!”
Afterwards, when he thought it all over dispassionately, Andy
wondered why he had talked to Miss Allen like that. He had not done
it deliberately, just to frighten her--yet he had frightened her to a
certain extent. He had roused her apprehension for the safety of her
neighbors and the ultimate well-being of himself and his fellows. She
had been so anxious over winning him to more peaceful ways that she had
forgotten to give him any details of the coming struggle. Andy was sorry
for that. He wished, on the way home, that he knew just what Florence
Grace Hallman intended to do.
Not that it mattered greatly. Whatever she did, Andy felt that it would
be futile. The Happy Family were obeying the land laws implicitly,
except as their real incentive had been an unselfish one. He could not
feel that it was wrong to try and save the Flying U; was not loyalty a
virtue? And was not the taking of land for the preservation of a fine,
fair dealing outfit that had made itself a power for prosperity and
happiness in that country, a perfectly laudable enterprise? Andy
believed so.
Even though they did, down in their deepest thoughts, think of the
Flying U's interest, Andy did not believe that Florence Grace Hallman or
anyone else could produce any evidence that would justify a contest for
their land. Though they planned among themselves for the good of
the Flying U, they were obeying the law and the dictates of their
range-conscience and their personal ideas of right and justice and
loyalty to their friends and to themselves. They were not conspiring
against the general prosperity of the country in the hope of great
personal gain. When you came to that, they were saving fifty men from
bitter disappointment--counting one settler to every eighty acres, as
the Syndicate apparently did.
Still, Andy wondered why he had represented himself and his friends to
be such bloodthirsty devils. He grinned wickedly over some of the things
he had said, and over her womanly perturbation and pleading that they
would spare the lives of their enemies. Oh, well--if she repeated half
to Florence Grace Hallman, that lady would maybe think twice before she
tackled the contract of boosting the Happy Family off their claims. So
at the last he managed to justify his lying to her. He liked Miss Allen.
He was pleased to think that at least she would not forget him the
minute he was out of her sight.
He went to sleep worrying, not over the trouble which Florence Grace
Hallman might be plotting to bring upon him, but about Miss Allen's
given name and her previous condition of servitude. He hoped that she
was not a stenographer, and he hoped her first name was not Mary; and
if you know the history of Andy Green you will remember that he had a
reason for disliking both the name and the vocation.
CHAPTER 11. A MOVING CHAPTER IN EVENTS
Having nothing more than a general warning of trouble ahead to disturb
him, Andy rode blithely back down the coulee and met the herd just after
sunrise. Dreams of Miss Allen had left a pleasant mood behind them,
though the dreams themselves withdrew behind the veil of forgetfulness
when he awoke. He wondered what her first name was. He wondered how far
Irish's acquaintance with her had progressed, but he did not worry much
about Irish. Having represented himself to be an exceedingly dangerous
man, and having permitted himself to be persuaded into promising
reform and a calm demeanor--for her sake--he felt tolerably sure of her
interest in him. He had heard that a woman loves best the taming of a
dangerous man, and he whistled and sang and smiled until the dust of the
coming herd met him full. Since he felt perfectly sure of the result, he
hoped that Florence Grace Hallman would start something, just so that he
might show Miss Allen how potent was her influence over a bad, bad man
who still has virtues worth nurturing carefully.
Weary, riding point on the loitering herd, grinned a wordless greeting.
Andy passed with a casual wave of his hand and took his place on the
left flank. From his face Weary guessed that all was well with the
claims, and the assurance served to lighten his spirits. Soon he heard
Andy singing at the top of his voice, and his own thoughts fell into
accord with the words of the ditty. He began to sing also, whenever
he knew the words. Farther back, Pink took it up, and then the others
joined in, until all unconsciously they had turned the monotonous drive
into a triumphal march.
“They're a little bit rough I must confess, the most of them at least,”
prompted Andy, starting on the second verse alone because the others
didn't know the song as well as he. He waited a second for them to join
him, and went on extolling the valor of all true cowboys:
“But long's you do not cross their trail you can live with
them at peace.
“But if you do they're sure to rule, the day you come to
their land,
“For they'll follow you up and shoot it out, and do it man to
man.”
“Say, Weary! They tell me Florence Grace is sure hittin' the warpost!
Ain't yuh scared?”
Weary shook his head and rode forward to ease the leaders into a narrow
gulch that would cut off a mile or so of the journey.
“Taking 'em up One Man?” called Pink, and got a nod for answer. There
was a lull in the singing while they shouted and swore at these stubborn
cows who would have tried to break back on the way to a clover patch,
until the gulch broadened into an arm of One Man Coulee itself. It was
all peaceful and easy and just as they had planned. The morning was cool
and the cattle contented. They were nearing their claims, and all that
would remain for them to do was the holding of their herd upon the
appointed grazing ground. So would the requirements of the law be
fulfilled and the machinations of the Syndicate be thwarted and the land
saved to the Flying U, all in one.
And then the leaders, climbing the hill at a point half a mile below
Andy's cabin, balked, snorted and swung back. Weary spurred up to push
them forward, and so did Andy and Pink. They rode up over the ridge
shouting and urging the reluctant cattle ahead, and came plump into the
very dooryard of a brand new shack. A man was standing in the doorway
watching the disturbance his presence had created; when he saw the three
riders come bulging up over the crest of the bluff, his eyes widened.
The three came to a stop before him, too astonished to do more than
stare. Once past the fancied menace of the new building and the man, the
cattle went trotting awkwardly across the level, their calves galloping
alongside.
“Hello,” said Weary at last, “what do you think you're doing here?”
“Me? I'm holding down a claim. What are you doing?” The man did not seem
antagonistic or friendly or even neutral toward them. He seemed to be
waiting. He eyed the cattle that kept coming, urged on by those who
shouted at them in the coulee below. He watched them spread out and go
trotting away after the leaders.
“Say, when did yuh take this claim?” Andy leaned negligently forward and
looked at him curiously.
“Oh, a week or so ago. Why?”
“I just wondered. I took it up myself, four weeks ago. Four forties I've
got, strung out in a line that runs from here to yonder. You've got over
on my land--by mistake, of course. I just thought I'd tell yuh,” he added
casually, straightening up, “because I didn't think you knew it before.”
“Thanks.” The man smiled one-sidedly and began filling a pipe while he
watched them.
“A-course it won't be much trouble to move your shack,” Andy continued
with neighborly interest. “A wheelbarrow will take it, easy. Back here
on the bench a mile or so, yuh may find a patch of ground that nobody
claims.”
“Thanks.” The man picked a match from his pocket and striking it on the
new yellow door-casing lighted his pipe.
Andy moved uneasily. He did not like that man, for all he appeared so
thankful for information. The fellow had a narrow forehead and broad,
high cheek bones and a predatory nose. His eyes were the wrong shade of
blue and the lids drooped too much at the outer corners. Andy studied
him curiously. Did the man know what he was up against, or did he not?
Was he sincere in his ready thanks, or was he sarcastic? The man looked
up at him then. His eyes were clean of any hidden meaning, but they
were the wrong shade of blue--the shade that is opaque and that you feel
hides much that should be revealed to you.
“Seems like there's been quite a crop of shacks grown up since I rode
over this way,” Weary announced suddenly, returning from a brief scurry
after the leaders, that inclined too much toward the south in their
travel.
“Yes, the country's settling up pretty fast,” conceded the man in the
doorway.
“Well, by golly!” bellowed Slim, popping up from below on a heaving
horse. Slim was getting fatter every year, and his horses always
puffed when they climbed a hill under his weight. His round eyes glared
resentfully at the man and the shack and at the three who were sitting
there so quietly on their horses--just as if they had ridden up for a
friendly call. “Ain't this shack on your land?” he spluttered to Andy.
“Why, yes. It is, just right at present.” Andy admitted, following the
man's example in the matter of a smoke, except that Andy rolled and
lighted a cigarette. “He's going to move it, though.”
“Oh. Thanks.” With the one-sided smile.
“Say, you needn't thank ME,” Andy protested in his polite tone. “YOU'RE
going to move it, you know.”
“You may know, but I don't,” corrected the other.
“Oh, that's all right. You may not know right now, but don't let that
worry yuh. This is sure a great country for pilgrims to wise up in.”
Big Medicine came up over the hill a hundred feet or so from them;
goggled a minute at the bold trespass and came loping across the
intervening space. “Say, by cripes, what's this mean?” he bawled.
“Claim-jumper, hey? Say, young feller, do you realize what you're
doing--squattin' down on another man's land. Don't yuh know
claim-jumpers git shot, out here? Or lynched?”
“Oh, cut out all that rough stuff!” advised the man wearily. “I know who
you are, and what your bluff is worth. I know you can't held a foot of
land if anybody is a mind to contest your claims. I've filed a contest
on this eighty, here, and I'm going to hold it. Let that soak into your
minds. I don't want any trouble--I'm even willing to take a good deal
in the way of bluster, rather than have trouble. But I'm going to stay.
See?” He waved his pipe in a gesture of finality and continued to
smoke and to watch them impersonally, leaning against the door in that
lounging negligence which is so irritating to a disputant.
“Oh, all right--if that's the way you feel about it,” Andy replied
indifferently, and turned away. “Come on, boys--no use trying to bluff
that gazabo. He's wise.”
He rode away with his face turned over his shoulder to see if the others
were going to follow. When he was past the corner and therefore out of
the man's sight, he raised his arm and beckoned to them imperatively,
with a jerk of his head to add insistence. The four of them looked after
him uncertainly. Weary kicked his horse and started, then Pink did
the same. Andy beckoned again, more emphatically than before, and Big
Medicine, who loved a fight as he loved to win a jackpot, turned
and glared at the man in the doorway as he passed. Slim was rumbling
by-golly ultimatums in his fat chest when he came up.
“Pink, you go on back and put the boys next, when they come up with the
drag they won't do anything much but hand out a few remarks and ride
on.” Andy said, in the tone of one who knows exactly what he means
to do. “This is my claim-jumper. Chances are I've got three more to
handle--or will have. Nothing like starting off right. Tell the boys
just rag the fellow a little and ride on, like we did. Get the cattle up
here and set Happy and Slim day-herding and the rest of us'll get busy.”
“You wouldn't tell for a dollar, would yuh?” Pi asked him with his
dimples showing.
“I've got to think it out first,” Andy evaded, “feel all the symptoms of
an idea. You let me alone a while.”
“Say, yuh going to tell him he's been found out and yuh know his past,”
began Slim, “like yuh done Dunk? I'll bet, by golly--”
“Go on off and lay down!” Andy retorted pettishly. “I never worked the
same one off on you twice, did I? Think I'm getting feeble-minded? It
ain't hard to put his nibs on the run--that's dead easy. Trouble is I
went and hobbled myself. I promised a lady I'd be mild.”
“Mamma!” muttered Weary, his sunny eyes taking in the shack-dotted
horizon. “Mild!--and all these jumpers on our hands!”
“Oh, well--there's more'n one way to kill a cat,” Andy reminded them
cheerfully. “You go on back and post the boys, Pink, not to get too
riled.”
He galloped off and left them to say and think what they pleased. He was
not uneasy over their following his advice or waiting for his plan. For
Andy Green had risen rapidly to a tacit leadership, since first he
told them of the coming colony. From being the official Ananias of the
outfit, king of all joke-makers, chief irritator of the bunch, whose
lightest word was suspected of hiding some deep meaning and whose
most innocent action was analysed, he had come to the point where
they listened to him and depended upon him to see a way out of
every difficulty. They would depend upon him now; of that he was
sure--therefore they would wait for his plan.
Strange as it may seem, the Happy Family had not seriously considered
the possibility of having their claims “jumped” so long as they kept
valid their legal residence. They had thought that they would be watched
and accused of collusion with the Flying U, and they intended to be
extremely careful. They meant to stay upon their claims at least seven
months in the year, which the law required. They meant to have every
blade of grass eaten by their own cattle, which would be counted as
improving their claims. They meant to give a homelike air of permanency
to their dwellings. They had already talked over a tentative plan
of bringing water to their desert claims, and had ridden over the
bench-land for two days, with the plat at hand for reference, that they
might be sure of choosing their claims wisely. They had prepared for
every contingency save the one that had arisen--which is a common
experience with us all. They had not expected that their claims would
be jumped and contests filed so early in the game, as long as they
maintained their residence.
However, Andy was not dismayed at the turn of events. It was stimulating
to the imagination to be brought face to face with an emergency such as
this, and to feel that one must handle it with strength and diplomacy
and a mildness of procedure that would find favor in the eyes of a girl.
He looked across the waving grass to where the four roomed shack was
built upon the four corners of four “eighties” so that four women might
live together and yet be said to live upon their own claims. That was
drawing the line pretty fine, of course; finer than the Happy Family
would have dared to draw it. But no one would raise any objection, on
account of their being women and timid about living alone. Andy smiled
sympathetically because the four conjunctive corners of the four claims
happened to lie upon a bald pinnacle bare of grass or shelter or water,
even. The shack stood bleakly revealed to the four winds--but also it
over looked the benchland and the rolling, half-barren land to the
west, which comprised Antelope Coulee and Dry Coulee and several other
good-for-nothing coulees capable of supporting nothing but coyotes and
prairie dogs and gophers.
A mile that way Andy rode, and stopped upon the steep side of a gulch
which was an arm of Antelope Coulee. He looked down into the gulch,
searched with his eyes for the stake that marked the southeast corner of
the eighty lying off in this direction from the shack, and finally saw
it fifty yards away on a bald patch of adobe.
He resisted the temptation to ride over and call upon Miss Allen--the
resistance made easier by the hour, which was eight o'clock or
thereabouts--and rode back to the others very well satisfied with
himself and his plan.
He found the whole Happy Family gathered upon the level land just
over his west line, extolling resentment while they waited his coming.
Grinning, he told them his plan, and set them grinning also. He gave
them certain work to be done, and watched them scatter to do his
bidding. Then he turned and rode away upon business of his own.
The claim-jumper, watching the bench land through a pair of field
glasses, saw a herd of cows and calves scattered and feeding contentedly
upon the young grass a mile or so away. Two men on horseback loitered
upon the outer fringe of the herd. From a distance hilltop came the
staccato sound of hammers where an other shack was going up. Cloud
shadows slid silently over the land, with bright sunlight chasing after.
Of the other horsemen who had come up the bluff with the cattle, he saw
not a sign. So the man yawned and went in to his breakfast.
Many times that day he stood at the corner of his shack with the glasses
sweeping the bench-land. Toward noon the cattle drifted into a coulee
where there was water. In a couple of hours they drifted leisurely
back upon high ground and scattered to their feeding, still watched and
tended by the two horsemen who looked the most harmless of individuals.
One was fat and red-faced and spent at least half of his time lying
prone upon some slope in the shade of his horse. The other was thin
and awkward, and slouched in the saddle or sat upon the ground with his
knees drawn up and his arms clasped loosely around them, a cigarette
dangling upon his lower lip, himself the picture of boredom.
There was nothing whatever to indicate that events were breeding in that
peaceful scene, and that adventure was creeping close upon the watcher.
He went in from his fourth or fifth inspection, and took a nap.
That night he was awakened by a pounding on the side of the shack where
was his window. By the time he had reached the middle of the floor--and
you could count the time in seconds--a similar pounding was at the door.
He tried to open the door and couldn't. He went to the window and could
see nothing, although the night had not been dark when he went to
bed. He shouted, and there was no reply; nor could he hear any talking
without. His name, by the way, was H. J. Owens, though his name does not
matter except for convenience in mentioning him. Owens, then, lighted a
lamp, and almost instantly was forced to reach out quickly and save it
from toppling, because one corner of the shack was lifting, lifting...
Outside, the Happy Family worked in silence. Before they had left One
Man Coulee they had known exactly what they were to do, and how to do
it. They knew who was to nail the hastily constructed shutter over the
window. They knew who was to fasten the door so that it could not be
opened from within. They knew also who were to use the crow-bars, who
were to roll the skids under the shack.
There were twelve of them--because Bert Rogers had insisted upon
helping. In not many more minutes than there were men, they were in
their saddles, ready to start. The shack lurched forward after the
straining horses. Once it was fairly started it moved more easily than
you might think it could do, upon crude runners made of cottonwood logs
eight inches or so in diameter and long enough for cross pieces bolted
in front and rear. The horses pulled it easily with the ropes tied to
the saddle-horns, just as they had many times pulled the roundup wagons
across mirey creeks or up steep slopes; just as they had many times
pulled stubborn cattle or dead cattle--just as they had been trained
to pull anything and everything their masters chose to attach to their
ropes.
Within, Owens called to them and cursed them. When they had just gained
an even pace, he emptied his revolver through the four sides of the
shack. But he did not know where they were, exactly, so that he was
compelled to shoot at random. And since the five shots seemed to have
no effect whatever upon the steady progress of the shack, he decided to
wait until he could see where to aim. There was no use, he reflected,
in wasting good ammunition when there was a strong probability that he
would need it later.
After a half hour or more of continuous travel, the shack tilted on a
steep descent. H. J. Owens blew out his lamp and swore when a box came
sliding against his shins in the dark. The descent continued until it
was stopped with a jolt that made him bite his tongue painfully, so that
tears came into the eyes that were the wrong shade of blue to please
Andy Green. He heard a laugh cut short and a muttered command, and that
was all. The shack heaved, toppled, righted itself and went on down, and
down, and down; jerked sidewise to the left, went forward and then swung
joltingly the other way. When finally it came to a permanent stand it
was sitting with an almost level floor.
Then the four corners heaved upward, two at a time, and settled with a
final squeal of twisted boards and nails. There was a sound of confused
trampling, and after that the lessening sounds of departure. Mr. Owens
tried the door again, and found it still fast. He relighted the lamp,
carried it to the window and looked upon rough boards outside the glass.
He meditated anxiously and decided to remain quiet until daylight.
The Happy Family worked hard, that night. Before daylight they were in
their beds and snoring except the two who guarded the cattle. Each was
in his own cabin. His horse was in his corral, smooth-coated and dry.
There was nothing to tell of the night's happenings,--nothing except the
satisfied grins on their faces when they woke and remembered.